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Research Confirms IBS Treated with Probiotics

Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) affects millions of people throughout the world. Somewhere between 10 and 20 percent of the world’s population suffers from IBS.

For decades, medical scientists assumed that IBS was an autoimmune disease related to ones genes. Yet research over the past two decades has confirmed that IBS is more related to ones gut flora.

Yes, we are speaking of ones probiotic – or in the case of IBS, pathogenic – bacteria. Our gut bacteria become very intimate with our intestines. Depending upon the species of bacteria colonizing ones gut, that relationship can either produce good digestion or irritable digestion. That is, irritable bowel syndrome.

Numerous studies confirm relationship between IBS and gut bacteria

International research has confirmed that not only do probiotics significantly treat irritable bowel syndrome: Certain probiotic species treat IBS better than others. And probiotics delivered to the intestines work better than those where most die in the stomach.

In fact, there have been so many studies that have confirmed this effect, that researchers are now conducting reviews and even reviews of reviews to confirm the evidence.

The most recent review, done in 2016, is actually a review of reviews. Scientists from Italy’s University of Perugia analyzed more than 300 studies. These included clinical studies and meta-analyses of multiple clinical studies. The researchers confirmed that probiotic therapies significantly and successfully treated IBS.

They also found that probiotics provided a more assured way of treating IBS than other known therapies, including fecal transplants. Furthermore, they found that one of the main reasons probiotics were so successful in treating IBS was because they compete with and defeat bacteria such as Escherichia coli, Clostridium and Salmonella.

In a metadata study published in the Spanish Medical Journal Revista Española de Enfermedades Digestivas, researchers calculated and compared the results of ten different clinical studies on irritable bowels and probiotics. The meta-analysis found that a number of species of probiotics produced significant improvement when used to treat irritable bowel syndrome. And some species treated IBS better than others.

The research concluded:

“Some probiotics are an effective therapeutic option for IBS patients, and the effects on each IBS symptom are likely species-specific.”

This of course confirms a myriad of studies showing that particular probiotic species have different mechanisms and effects upon the intestines. It also points to the fact that IBS is related to having a lack of normal probiotic colonies – also referred to as microbiota.

The researchers computed what is called the standardized mean difference between the different treatments. SMD equates to the intervention effect – or the percentage of effectiveness of that particular treatment.

The research found that pain was specifically reduced when IBS patients were treated with Bifidobacterium breve, Bifidobacterium longum and/or Lactobacillus acidophilus. The research also determined that irritable bowel distension – a type of inflammation – was successfully treated with Bifidobacterium infantis, Lactobacillus casei, and Lactobacillus plantarum.

The research further found that all of the probiotic species tested were successful in reducing flatulence among the patients. These included Bifidobacterium breve, Bifidobacterium infantis and several other species.

Other studies confirm these findings

A much larger recent study, funded by the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), confirmed that pathogenic bacteria overgrowth was significantly related to IBS, and related to increased pain and chronic inflammation.

This study analyzed a total of 74 studies and 84 clinical trials involving 10,351 patients.

The results of this research also determined that specific species – and specific strains among those species – had particularly significant ability to improve IBS. Interestingly, this research also found that particular strains of Lactobacillus acidophilus improved IBS significantly, but not generic (no strain identified) Lactobacillus acidophilus. The effect of non-strain specified L. acidophilus was positive, but not as significant as certain strains.

This study also found that probiotics helped IBS patients of all ages.

Treatment doses – in CFUs or Colony Forming Units – were in the billions for successful outcomes.

Longer treatment periods also increased the effectiveness of the probiotic treatments. And multiple species were more effective than single species treatments, at 37 percent versus 27 percent effective.

In total, treatments of eleven different probiotics in different studies were able to reduce irritable bowel syndrome by an average of 45 percent, with some species more effective than others.

Case Adams is a California Naturopath with a PhD in Natural Health Sciences, and Board Certified Alternative Medicine Practitioner. He has authored 26 books on natural healing strategies. “My journey into writing about alternative medicine began about 9:30 one evening after I finished with a patient at the clinic I practiced at over a decade ago. I had just spent the last two hours explaining how diet, sleep and other lifestyle choices create health problems and how changes in these, along with certain herbal medicines and other natural strategies can radically yet safely turn ones health around. As I drove home that night, I realized I needed to get this knowledge out to more people. So I began writing about health with a mission to reach those who desperately need this information. The strategies in my books and articles are backed by scientific evidence along with wisdom handed down through traditional medicines for thousands of years.”